Apparatus for mining phosphates.



PATBNTED 06T. s, 190s.

I. BEATEY. A APPARATUS FOR MINING PHOSPHATES.

APPLICATION FILED JUNE 4. 1901.

N0 MODEL.

Patented October G, 1903.

PATENT OEEIOE.

i .IOIIN .Beltran OE BONE HILL, FLORIDA.

APPARATUS FOR MINING PHOSPHATES.

,SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 740,731, dated October6, 1903.

Application filed d une 4, 1901. Serial No. 63,055. (No model.)

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, JOHN BEATEY, of Bone Hill, in the county of Polk andState of Florida, have invented certain new and useful Improvements inApparatus for Mining Phosphates, of which the following is aspeciiication.

The object of the present invention is the handling of phosphatic pebbleand its .delivery from the sump in the pit to the washing and cleaningmechanism.

As is well known, phosphatic pebble is found in deposits varying inthickness from one to twenty or thirty feet and is covered with anoverburden of barrenv material from Oneto twenty feet deep. In miningthe phosphate, as illustrated upon the accompanying drawing, an area ofland is stripped of its overburden and thephosphatic pebble Washed downby a powerful hydraulic stream. IVhen the phosphate `is exhausted, wateris allowed to flow into the pit to fioat the dredge upon which thewashing and cleaningV apparatus is mounted, and a fresh pit is formed.

The pebble is washed down into an artificial hollow or sump, from whichit has heretofore been drawn, with the water, by a primary centrifugalpump mounted on the dredge and delivered to. the washin g and cleaningapparatus. By reason of the depth of the pit it has hitherto beenimpossible to utilize the pump to its fullest capacity, for a pump ofthe character described cannot by suction lift water alone over (about)thirty feet, and hence by reason of the greater speciiic gravity of thephosphatic pebble the latter has not been raised with the water. As thedistance between the pump on the dredge and the inlet of thesuction-pipe isfrequentlythirty feet,or thereabout, greatdifiicultyhasbeen ex-v perienced in raising the phosphate atterit has been washeddown by the hydraulic stream,

and much phosphate has been consequentlyv left in the deposit, as thepump would not lift the phosphate that lies below a depth of twenty-sixfeet.

. In mining land-pebble phosphate there are to be found many depositslwhere the overburden is from fteen to twenty feet deep, with a likedepth of phosphate underneath, and under the old system of mining thiscould I* not be worked.

With my present system or apparatus I have removed fifteen to twentyfeet of overburden, and twenty to twenty-five feet of phosphate depositis successfully mined. This is done by first removing the overburdenwith steam-shovels and in other ways excavating or mining out a pit tothe depth of ten to fteen feet in the phosphate and then placing thepump and engine in the bottom of this pit, so that atl times themachinery is down to a depth of forty feet from the surface of theearth.

I employ two centrifugal pumps, one set upon a level with the surface ofthe earthto the pump located on the boat or pumpingstation on thesurface. The latter raises the material to the point of discharge,lifting it at times over forty feet in height. From the point where thesuction-pipe takes up the material at the bottom of sump-hole to thepoint of discharge I have successfully pumped through over iive hundredlfeet of pipe and and raised the material from where it enters the pumpto where it discharges into the rotary screen-*a total height ofeighty-two feet.

Thus it will be seen that by my present invention I have surmounted thedifliculties hitherto found almost insurmountable and am able to deliverthe pebble in great quantities and Without loss of power to the dredge.

On the drawing the dredge is indicated at l, and `it is floated on theartificial pond 2.

`On the dredge is placed the washing and cleaning apparatus,(illustrated conventionally at 3,) from which the pebble is deliveredtothe cars 4. The water is forced into the pipe 5, connected at its endto a giant nozzle 6, by a pump 7, also mounted on the dredge. There is aso-called primary centrifugal pump 8 on the dredge, upon which reliancehas hitherto been placed for drawingthe mixed water and phosphate fromthe sump 9 through a ,pipe 10.

IOC

According to the present invention I locate at the bottom of the pit,intermediate of the pump 8 and the sump 9, a centrifugal pump l1, whichsucks the material from the sump and assists the pump 8 in elevating itto the apparatus at 3. The pump 11 is driven by an engine l2, to whichsteam may be conveyed by a pipe 13 from the boiler 14 on the dredge. Theengine or motor l2 for driving the lower pump l1 is separate from andindependent of the engine or motor on the dredge which operates the pump8, 'and therefore the relative positions of the two pumps may be readilyaltered when occasion demands it. Moreover, one pump may be drivenfaster than the other, if desired, or if the apparatus is to be usedwhere no great elevation of the material is required the lower pump maybe readily disconnected. By reason of this arrangement of mechanism I amable to elevate more material than where two independent pumps areplaced upon the dredge.

An attempt has been made to obviate the diiiiculty referred to bymounting the primary pump upon an independent dredge and coupling it intandem with the pump adjacent the washing apparatus but it has not yetproved successful, owing to the dept-h of pit and sump and theimpossibility of raising the material to the desired height.

S0 far as I am aware, I am the first to have coupled a pump in tandemwith the primary pump (so called) and to have arranged it at the bottomof tl e pit, whereby it is possible to mine phosphate where it was notpossible before, the production has been immensely increased, and thecost lessened, and the mining of phosphate practically revolutionized.Having thus explained the nature of the invention, and described a wayof constructing and using the same, although without. having attemptedto set forth all of the forms in which it may be made or all of themodes of its use, I declare that what I claim is An apparatus for miningphosphatic pebble, comprising a station having washing and cleaningapparatus for the material and a pump and motor therefor for elevatingthe material thereto, a pipe extending from said pump to the sump, andanvauxiliary pump having an independent motor, said auxiliary pump beingcoupled with said pipe and intermediate the first named pump and thesump end of the pipe and arranged in a plane considerably below that ofthe first-mentioned pump and at or near the level of material in thesump for drawing said material from the sump and forcing it to thefirst-mentioned pump in the upper plane, the pipe connection between thetwo pumps being directly to the inlet of the upper one from the outletor discharge of the lower one, whereby there is no opportunity forsettling of material between the two pumps, means being provided forfurnishing power from the station for operating the lower pump.

In testimony whereof I have afxed my sig-A nature in presence of twowitnesses.

JOHN BEATEY. lVitnesses:

SoLoN G. WILSON, C. A. BAswELL.

